


anything clean

by kangeiko



Category: Alias
Genre: Gen, Pre-Canon, Russia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-14
Updated: 2006-08-14
Packaged: 2017-10-07 18:14:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/67835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kangeiko/pseuds/kangeiko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her sisters do this for her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	anything clean

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: you don't get anything clean without getting something else dirty (cecil baxter)
> 
>  
> 
> For the [](http://community.livejournal.com/alias500/profile)[**alias500**](http://community.livejournal.com/alias500/) challenge, Bruce Springsteen song titles. The chosen song title is "American Skin".

Her sisters do this for her. It is, she knows, the act they may be allowed together. It is certainly the last time she will be allowed here, in the house of her grandparents.

Her grandmother is old, wizened; almost doubled over, she carries buckets of hot water from the stove, pouring them one after the other in the metal tub. Steam rises and is lost in the low ceiling of the bathroom. Her grandmother looks almost comical, her body bowing under the weight of the bucket and her skirts hitched up. Her feet are bare as she walks unsteadily across the grooved floor, nudging the kneeling girls out of the way with bony knees.

Her sisters have tied up their hair and skirts, their blouses sticking to their skins in the steam and fading into transparency. Neither wear brassieres, and their nipples are ruddy and flushed against the thin cotton.

Outside, the storm winds a little tighter, as if to grant them a moment or two longer. It is no use, of course. They cannot delay. They hold on to a hand each and push her under the hot water - no longer boiling, but not far off - scrubbing her with pumice stones and loofahs and other bits of cloth. She does not struggle, nor kick as she once had as a little one, but stays patiently under the water, letting her sisters do their work. They scrub her all over, from the soles of her feet to the thin skin of her eyelids and all between, pushing soapy fingers between her legs. She thinks that she might expire from it.

At last, she is allowed breath. Her skin has been scrubbed red, welts rising from the heat and the friction. They will fade quickly enough on her journey, and she is not worried. She will have to prepare herself for worse, she thinks, once she arrives at her destination.

Her mother enters the bathroom, almost unseen in the gloom. The little oil light in the corner flickers precariously as she sits herself on a stool. "Are you ready?" She asks, and nods at her daughter's nakedness. "Your escort is here."

Irina's gaze flickers to the far corner, where a duffel bag with blue jeans and white cotton knickers sits, waiting, like a freshly cut pelt.

 

*

fin


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